It was 24 years ago on January 18th, 1988 that the 88-foot trawler Wayward Wind ran into trouble 115 miles southwest of Kodiak near the Trinity Islands.

It was shortly after midnight, aboard the Wayward Wind, that a crewmember informed the captain of the vessel that the deck was underwater. The captain had the crewmember tell the rest of the crew to get into their survival suits.

The mate of the vessel sent a distress call out on the radio while the captain attempted to pump out the flooded compartments, but the effort was fruitless, the vessel’s stern continued to settle deeper and deeper into the rough seas. The captain knew then that the Wayward Wind could not be saved.

The captain’s wife, when she entered the frigid water, took the vessel’s class B Emergency Positioning Indicating Beacon with her. Within a quarter an hour of the crew entering the water, the Wayward Wind slipped beneath the surface stern first.

Alerted by the Mayday sent by the vessel’s mate, the United States Coast Guard launched a C-130 aircraft at 3:20 am. They homed in on the emergency beacon and arrived on the watery scene. The crew of the C-130 dropped flares into the water to mark the location of the EPIRB signal. A short time later, a Coast Guard helicopter, an HH-3F Pelican, that launched at 2:15 am, came to the scene and lifted the captain’s wife, Debra Nielson, and a deckhand, Jay Rasmussen, to safety.The weather at the time of the rescue was horrible, high winds and heavy sea was reported. Visibility was limited because of blowing snow.

The rest of the crew would later be found by the fishing vessel Cougar, they had also responded to the Mayday call. Between 7:30 and 8:30 am, the lifeless bodies of the Wayward Wind’s skipper, William “Red” Nietupski, James C. Baglien, and David Descloux were pulled from the rough seas in the Northern Gulf. It wasn’t until 11:30 am that David J Descloux was retrieved from the sea. He was taken to the hospital in Kodiak, he lingered until 4:30 in the afternoon before passing away.

Now, 24 years later, on July 19th, 2012, the crew of the HH-3F Pelican that fetched two lucky survivors from the rough seas of the Gulf of Alaska were honored for their heroic rescue efforts from the days before Rescue Swimmers.

Honorable citations were read by Rear Admiral Thomas P. Ostebo, and each of the aircrewmembers were awarded the Air Medal for their actions. Air Medals went to Commander Joe Mattina, Commander Chris Broxterman, Petty Officer 1st Class Marty Heckerman, and Petty Officer 2nd Class Claude Brown.

Debra Neilson, one of the two survivors of the sinking fishing vessel Wayward Wind, gave her thanks to the Coast Guard HH-3F Pelican helicopter crew who rescued her more than 24 years ago.

Neilson would later explain that the aircrew also saved the life of her future daughter whom she was carrying at the time of the rescue.